


Lessons learned and a boot full of kisses

by Multifandom_damnation



Category: Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters (2013)
Genre: Gen, I Don't Even Know, Minor Violence, Non-Graphic Violence, Protective Siblings, Random & Short, Sibling Bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-10-24
Packaged: 2021-03-09 06:33:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27169369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Multifandom_damnation/pseuds/Multifandom_damnation
Summary: It was late at night when Gretel was dragged into an alleyway and savagely beaten, but while an ordinary person would be terrified, Gretel wasn’t an ordinary person. It's safe to say that when Hansel finds out, he isn't very happy about it.
Relationships: Gretel & Hansel (Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 13





	Lessons learned and a boot full of kisses

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know why I wrote this, but I watched Hansel and Gretel again the other day and I was pleasantly reminded of how much I love this movie, so I just finally had to give in to that urge and write something about it. I mostly just wanted to write about Hansel and Gretel being loving siblings and taking care of each other because that was always my favourite part of the movie, but I needed this fic to have plot and substance, so you get a little bit extra as well. And I also really love that Hansel has mythical diabetes, because having a badass character having a very detrimental weakness and needs being looked after now and then is always my fave. Anyway, I doubt anyone will read this because the movie came out in 2013, but for those few of you who do, I hope you enjoy this.

It was late at night when Gretel was dragged into an alleyway and savagely beaten, but while an ordinary person would be terrified, Gretel wasn’t an ordinary person, and when the first punch landed against her face and fingers dig into her arm so tight she thought she might bruise, she simply twisted around and pulled her gun from the holster on her hip, and after another punch collided with her face, her assailants turned and ran before she even had to fire a warning shot.

She already knew who they were, of course. The same morons who were watching them as they arrived in the town, and yelled lewd taunts at her until her brother had brandished his shotgun. She had told him that he was overreacting, but now, as a bruise blossomed on her cheekbone and blood poured from her mouth down her chin, perhaps she might have spoken too soon.

On guard, she made her way through the town with her hand on her crossbow, just in case. Not that she was too worried, but they had gotten the jump on her once before and the fright of a gun pointed at their face wasn’t going to keep them away forever, 

The rented room that she and Hansel were staying at for the night was easy to find, with its low ceiling and rickety wooden planks, the holes in the tin roof letting the elements in and the door not quite fitting on the hinges, but they had made do for the night by pressing a trunk up against it while they slept. Gretel had moved it aside when she left for her evening stroll, so she had no trouble getting back inside.

Shutting the door behind her, she was mildly pleased to see that everything was where she had left it, especially her brother, asleep soundly on the floor with his head tucked into the crook of his arm and his other hand resting on the handle of his gun. As she shut the door as quietly as she could, his clock began to tick incessantly, and she sighed sadly. He didn’t stir, and she gently nudged him with her foot. He awoke with a start, snorting slightly as he lifted off the ground and searched the room with bleary eyes for any sign of danger. She waited for him to get his bearings before he realized, and he glanced down at his watch as it ticked.

Groaning, he laid back down on the ground and began to dig through the pouch on his hip for his medicine, and Gretel watched with pursed lips as he pulled his shirt up, twisted the end and drove the needle straight into his skin. He no longer felt the sting as it bit into his flesh, and when he eventually removed it, a bead of blood remained but he took no notice of it as he tugged his shirt back over it.

“You OK?” she asked quietly as she sat her crossbow down on the small desk and stepped over his feet.

“Of course I’m OK,” he grumbled as she sat down, and Gretel almost laughed at how petulant and childish he sounded, the slur to his words not helping in the slightest. “I got it in time, didn’t I?”

She began to get undressed, removing her coat and her gloves before bending down to untie the laces of her boots. Hansel had convinced her to buy a size too big, and he had installed metal plating within the toe, which was much more useful than any of the boots they could have found at a simple vender. “You’ve been drinking,” she stated matter-of-factly and was mostly just annoyed that he didn’t invite her along.

“I’m drunk, not dead,” he griped as he peered at her in the darkness, blinking sleep out of his eyes. He sat up, sliding backwards on his hands, and fumbled for a candle and a match. “Where have you been? Did you just get in?”

“I was talking to the sheriff,” she replied. “He told me all the hotspots and gave me permission to scout them out after curfew. I was just making sure we know where we’re going tomorrow, unlike you, who went out drinking.”

“I’m only human, Gretel, despite what people may think,” Hansel yawned as he managed to fumble with the match and light the candle. The wick flared then ignited, and he blinked around the room as darkness receded. Gretel was in the middle of adjusting her hair, brushing it out of her face and tying it back when Hansel saw it, and when he finally did, he felt his blood flow cold. “Gretel? What the hell is that?”

“What?” Gretel asked innocently, busying herself by looking in the opposite direction. “What’s your problem?”

She felt hands on her chin, and a little reluctantly, she let Hansel turn her face towards him so he could take a better look at the marks on her face, and she watched as his eyes darted from her bruised cheekbone to the blood down her chin, and his face hardened like stone. “Who did this to you, Gretel? Who did this to you?”

“Nobody,” Gretel hushed as she reached up and held his hands to her face. A strand of hair fell forward into her eyes, and Hansel brushed it back behind her ear before placing his hands back where they were, watching her with worried eyes. “It’s alright, Hansel. I’m alright.”

“It was _them_ , wasn’t it?” Hansel demanded, moving his thumb across so he could prod at the blooming bruise on her cheekbone, and she hissed and tried to pull away from his hold. He let her go but reached for her hand before she could get too far. “The ones who were watching you when we first arrived, right? The bargemen.”

“Go back to sleep,” Gretel said gently as she brought his hand to her mouth and placed a kiss on his bruised and scraped knuckles.

“Gretel…” Hansel tried to protest as he helplessly watched Gretel climb into the bed and pull the covers back.

“We’re going to leave town tomorrow anyway. Once we kill this witch, we’ll be out of here before night falls on the second night, and they’ll never bother us again,” Gretel insisted as she climbed into bed. “In fact, I doubt I’ll even think of them again. They mean nothing, Hansel, and they won’t be the first men who thought that they could lay a hand on me.”

Hansel was silent as he watched Gretel get ready for bed, and just as she was sure that he had dropped the conversation, he spoke again. “Did you let them keep it?”

“Keep what?”

“Their hands,”

Gretel smiled as he rolled over onto her side, turning her back to Hansel to let him know that the conversation was over now. “They ran away before I could take them. I suppose a loaded gun pointed at the temple is enough to dissuade anyone to beat me up and put a baby in me.”

She listened to Hansel settle back down and blow out the candle, double-checking that the trunk had been pushed back in front of the door again before he spoke into the silence. “It’s a shame. You’re much kinder than I would have been.”

That was the last Gretel thought of it. When she woke, it was to the sound of Hansel counting bullet shells and cleaning weaponry, and he tossed her a bag of gold to count. She paid no attention to the faint pulsing pain that danced across her cheekbone or the burn from her bit tongue and split lip. In fact, she had almost entirely forgotten about the confrontation the night before, if it weren’t for the way Hansel kept sneaking her angry, worried glances when he thought she wasn’t looking, or the way he was silent and contemplative as he tended to his weapons.

Later that day, when Gretel was out purchasing supplies for their witch hunt and rations for their journey on the road, Hansel made his way to the docks and sought out the bargemen. Nobody dared stop him as he passed, and he wasn’t sure if that was due to the intent of his walk, the expression on his face of the large gun that was strapped across his back. It was probably the walk.

He found them smoking in a corner alley, seated on barrels with thick cigars trailing dirty smoke upwards into the cloudy sky. He didn’t announce himself. He didn’t have to. He kicked the barrel out from under one of the men and stole the cigarette from the mouth of the other before either of them saw him, and then he pulled a dagger, still stained with witches blood, from the loop in his belt and pushed the man up against the wall.

“Look, you know who I am and why I’m here, so I’ll just cut to the chase,” Hansel said. As the other man scrambled up off the ground, he sighed and pulled his gun from his back and pointed it at him, stopping him in his tracks. “Last night, you thought it would be a good idea to attack my sister on her way home. And I’m here to tell you that it was, in reality, a very bad idea.”

“W-we meant nothing by it,” said the man with Hansel’s gun in his face, hands up at his sides. “Honest.”

Hansel ignored him. “Now, you see, she can unquestionably take care of herself, and if she even knew I was here, she would kick my ass and then come after you to finish the job. So I’m not going to kill you, even though it would be so easy and so satisfying to do because if she had _really_ wanted you dead, she would have killed you last night when you thought it fitting to lay your dirty hands on her.”

The man still pressed against the wall under him gulped. “If you’re not going to k-kill us, then what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to leave you with a reminder to never lay your hands on another woman again,” Hansel smiled. “And that if you ever think about hurting my fucking sister, then you’ll have to deal with me. Again."

Gretel waited for Hansel in the town square, occupying herself with a free pinwheel handed to her by an elderly woman at a cart, blowing into it idly as she leant against the fountain with bags at her feet. After about ten minutes or so, he finally joined her on the fountain, the splashing water hitting the back of his neck, and looked at her strangely. “What’s with the pinwheel?”

“I’m not quite sure, actually. An old woman gave it to me for free as I passed by. People are handing them out everywhere. Must mean something,” she handed her pinwheel to a passing kid, who grabbed it with wide eyes and darted off back to her mother with a giggle. She turned to Hansel and narrowed her eyes. “Is that blood on your tunic?”

Frowning, Hansel pulled at his shirt and glanced down at the now-dried stain. “So it is,” he mused. “Must have leaked out of the gun while I was cleaning it this morning. You know how those bog witches are. Very watery,” he nodded towards the bags at her feet. “Have you got everything we need?”

Rolling her eyes at her brother's antics, Gretel leant down and began sifting through the bags, pulling out various items as she named them. “An iron rod, straw, a big stone, a length of twine, flint and steel… and rations for the road. Jerky, your favourite.”

“More jerky. Great,” he joked. She elbowed him in the side, and he laughed as he shoved her back and away from him. “Are you ready to get this show on the road?”

“Ready to kill another witch. My favourite,” she griped half-heartedly as she stood and offered Hansel a hand up. “But at least the pay is good-  _ Hanse l !” _

She screeched as he used her momentum to shove her face-first into the cold fountain, the water splashing and displacing over the sides with the force of her impact, and though the sound wasn’t the most dignified from one of the two famous witch hunters, all she could think about was her brother's obnoxious laughter as he collected a bag or two and took off running in the opposite direction.

Without even having time to come up with an appropriate threat, Gretal momentarily occupied the idea of shooting Hansel with her crossbow before she dismissed it. She clambered out of the fountain gathered up the remaining bags and chased her cackling brother, wet and dripping, throughout the town.   



End file.
